News

05/12/2010

OTA Education Foundation

Donor Agrees to Match Donations from Industry

The OTA Education Foundation needs help from members of Ontario’s trucking industry to help fund its trucking industry scholarship program by making a donation before June 30th, and as an added push, the Foundation’s 2010 Double-Up Donation Challenge was recently announced. Under the challenge, donations received before the deadline will be matched – up to $40,000 in total – by a generous supporter with ties to the trucking industry.

“We really want to see industry step-up this year and help us reach our target of $40,000, says Scott Smith, Foundation chairman and president of J. D. Smith and Sons. “What’s different about this challenge is that we are really trying to encourage more ‘new donors’ which are companies that have never donated before and those who may have missed helping us in the previous three years, to make a donation this year”.Under the matching program, donations from “new donors” will be matched dollar-for-dollar. Existing supporters – those that have donated in the previous three years – are encouraged to donate a minimum amount. Donations from existing supporters that are over $1,000 will also be matched.“We are really excited about this”, continued Smith. “Through a similar matching program announced in 2008, the Foundation was able to increase the amount of scholarships disbursed in 2009 by 132% over the amount disbursed in 2008. We hope to be able to give out even more in scholarship dollars for the academic year starting this September”.

Donations received under this matching program are used to fund scholarships offered exclusively to children of parents who work in the Ontario trucking and trucking-related industry. Ontario carriers and industry suppliers are encouraged to promote these scholarship opportunities to their workers. For more information, click on www.ontruck.org/educationfoundation or e-mail the Foundation’s executive director, Betsy Sharples, at education.foundation@ontruck.org.